


The Eyes Of War

by Just_a_Loth_Cat



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Badass Ladies, Dorne, Dragons, Gen, Peace, The Children of the Forrest, The Others - Freeform, War, What I would love to see happen, the north - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-05
Updated: 2016-06-05
Packaged: 2018-07-12 12:59:29
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,501
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7104553
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Just_a_Loth_Cat/pseuds/Just_a_Loth_Cat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Daenerys has taken the South, but Sansa Stark still holds the North. She sues for peace to save her family, her lands, and her people.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Eyes Of War

The messenger that rode out to greet them flew the Stark sigil beneath a white flag of peace. Beside Danny, Tyrion cursed and she heard him mutter, “Is that the thrice-damned Hound? How did he find his way North?”

Danny didn’t know what he was muttering about. It was a viciously scarred man that approached him, no dog in sight. He rode on a great black beast of a horse which even her Kharl husband would have been honored to mount. If it feared her dragons, it feared its master more.

“Queen Daenerys Stormborn, Mother ‘o Dragons and Conqueror of Westeros. Sansa Stark, Queen in the North, extends her greetings and wishes to meet with you and your advisors to sue for peace.”

His voice was rough and unpleasant; his words were too practiced. He was not, Danny thought, a born messenger. Perhaps he was the only man brave enough to deliver this Northern Queen’s words. If so, Danny doubted taking the North would be anything so difficult as Jorah had warned her it could be. 

“Fiercely loyal,” Jorah had warned. “And bitter fighters. It was only a complete wipe of their leadership that allowed the Lanisters to defeat them in the first war. Treachery from their rival bannermen. Sansa Stark will not make the same mistakes her brother made.”

But this Sansa Stark could only find one stupidly brave solider to deliver her message. Still, Danny would humor her, if only because there was little to rule over when she was forced to burn her kingdom to the ground.

“She invites you, and your advisors and guards, to dine with her and discuss the conditions of peace.”

“Does Lady Sansa think we are so stupid that we would walk into the home of our enemies, just like her brother, and let ourselves be slaughtered?” Tyrion snapped.

The messenger looked angry, or perhaps that was just the usual set of his face. Or he was smiling?

Danny thought to interrupt before a premature fight began the war for them.

“I will meet with your Queen, ser. Tyrion, ser Jorah, and my Blood Riders shall accompany me. They will be enough to protect if there is some…uncouth plan to kill me.”  
“There ain’t, but you’re welcome to bring whoever ya’ like.”

Her Blood Riders, Tyrion, and Jorah followed in her wake as she rode toward Winterfell. Danny had known nothing but the hot for so long – of deserts and dragonfire – that the cold of the North was almost unbearable. She wondered how Sansa Stark could stand it.

She rode though the high gates of Winterfell, and with something like shock, realized that they had massive holes in them, filled with ice so thick and strong that it was no longer clear, but the murky grey of stone. Every building of Winterfell seemed to have met the same treatment. Tyrion had told her that the beacon of the North had been taken and overrun by the Krakens, and largely destroyed in the process. Then, she had been told, it had been taken by the Bastard Ramsey Snow, who had begun to rebuild it in the name of House Bolton. They had only begun rebuilding, with a false Stark to justify their claim, when the true Direwolf Queen had swept in with an army from the Erye and taken it back for her own family.

Her people bustled around them. Even children played in the cold, their pale cheeks stained with red from the cold. They stopped to stare at the entourage as Danny passed. But they were children, and returned to their games when she had gone by.

Danny had assumed she would be led to a throne room – she had imagined a version of her own in Meereen, but decorated with ice and wolf banners. Instead, she found herself in a Hall filled with long tables and benches. Enormous fires burning in grates taller than a man a kept the room warm. Men, women, and children bustled in here as they had outside, some eating, others cleaning. There was even a group of women who were working together to sew a blanket decorated with the sigil of their queen. The calm chatter fell silent when they entered, and the people looked up at her.

At the farthest wall, the Queen in the North sat with her advisors, whispering and pouring over maps and plans. A very young girl, perhaps only Danny’s age when she had married Drogo, stood at Sansa’s right hand. She was tall, lanky, had chopped brown hair, and her fingers rested on the hilt of a thin blade at her hip. Her eyes were sharp as they met Danny’s. On Sansa’s other side was a woman wrapped in a heavy cloak. Her skin was the near-black of the Free Cities, but her accent, when she spoke and her words carried across the room, reminded Danny of Quentyn Martell. 

There were others around her – men and other women who murmured together and pointed and gesticulated.

Sansa Stark, a pale slip of a girl, sat in the center. Her eyes were huge and dark and her hair was a vibrant red. With a look like that, Danny understood how Sansa had tempted armies to her call. Danny was aware the power a beautiful queen could wield over her people’s hearts. But Sansa Stark had no dragons or Unsullied or Dorthraki. She had a few knights from the Veil and the soldiers that were left from the North. They stood no chance.

Sansa Stark stood and the Hound, Jorah had whispered that “No, my Queen, that is his name,” joined her at the table. The Queen of the North moved around her loyal supporters, Danny saw her murmur something to the Hound, and walked toward Danny. When she approached, those pretty lips broke into a heart-stopping smile.

“Queen Daenerys Stormborn, Mother of Dragons, Conqueror of Westeros,” the words fell smoother from her lips than from the Hound’s, “thank you for joining me. We in the North, and all over Westeros I believe, tire of war and seek only peace. I hope you will help me find it this day.” 

Danny nearly jumped when whoops and shouts of praise echoed around the chamber.

She held her head high and matched Sansa Stark’s smile. “So this is the Queen of the North. I have heard many, many things of you. I hope that you are as impressive as they say – for your own sake. Let us sit and talk peace.”

She had seen her threats strike fear into the eyes and hearts of the Great Masters in Meereen, into the leaders of sellsword companies, into her very dragons themselves. Sansa Stark smiled. 

“I only hope I live up to your expectations, your Majesty.” 

She curtsied in the Western way.

“Please join me for some mulled wine. You must be cold from the journey. My understanding is that you came of age in the desert. Lady Sarella Sand, my Septa, did as well – she is from Dorne, you see, and she cannot abide the cold. Her work here is beyond measure, and her willingness to stay with me is most humbling.” 

Sansa’s eyes fell on Tyrion. Something flashed through them so quickly that Danny could not read them. She dropped into another curtsy. 

“Lord Tyrion. It has been too long. I am pleased to see you live. And that you have found a worthy cause to devote yourself to.”

Danny glanced to Tyrion and saw that the dwarf was struck speechless.

“You have met my advisor?” Danny asked to fill the silence.

Sansa laughed, “He was my Lord Husband. Until he was accused of murder and fled. I rather think that our marriage vows were annulled before men and Gods. I must admit, I am not proud of my actions regarding your persecution. I did not know the poison had been planted on me. Nor that the Tyrells had plans afoot – in retrospect, I should have. All I can promise is that Petyr Baelish, the man who planned the murder and framed you, is dead.” Her lips twisted a little as she poured wine for her guests. “And you have either killed or imprisoned the Queen of Thorns. I can only hope that your trials have proven beneficial, if not deserved.”

“I – I hold no ill-will toward you, my Lady. You sought your opportunity to escape. It was not your fault that it came at my expense. Nor that you were an unwilling tool.” Tyrion licked his lips.

“Indeed, and I shall not be again. I believe the cook has baked some fresh bread for the occasion. You must be tired of the food of travel. May I offer you some? I’m afraid we lack the usual fixings. Our rations provider was working his way up the coast, and I can only hope that he has not met with the Kraken. We are rebuilding the greenhouses, as you may have seen, but the process is slow and it will take months yet before the plants begin to produce.”

Danny wondered why this girl was telling them all her secrets. Was she a fool with a loose tongue, or did she truly intend to bend the knee in her pursuit of peace. Personally, Danny hoped for the latter.

They were seated around the table, Danny and Sansa both surrounded by their most trusted and the others interspersed where room had been made for them. The wine was bitter, a winter wine, Danny supposed, but it was hot and the spice cleared her head. She drank deeply. After she had, the others around the table did as well. Only one man did not have a goblet or bread before him.

Danny glanced passed him, then back, then harder. He was pale – like death – and his eyes were sunken. He wore black, a heavy cloak made of fur, and his hair was the same deep brown-black color as Sansa’s young guard girl. The guard girl leaned over and murmured something to him at which he laughed. There was something wrong in the set of his lips and the way his skin moved.

“Please, introduce me to your advisors. It pleases me to see so many women at your table. I found they can make the best advisors. My own translator and highest advisor, Missandei, is leading my army with Greyworm.”

Sansa beamed. “Oh, I agree. This is my sister, Arya Stark, my guard, advisor, and a master of the sword.” The short-haired girl shot Danny a cocky grin. Danny thought she rather liked this Arya. “Next to her is my half-brother and leader of the Night’s Watch, Jon Snow. We have been working together to stop the siege from North of the Wall.”

Danny had heard tell of frozen monsters marching south. She had given it little thought. Ice monsters could do nothing against her dragons.

“You have already met ser Sandor Clegane.” Sansa gestured at the Hound. “Beyond him is Meera Reed and her father Lord Howland Reed of Greywater Watch. She is the hero who escaped from the North and brought us knowledge of our true enemies.”

Meera was wiry like her father, and they had the same unruly, brown, Northern hair. She looked terribly serious and held Danny’s gaze.

“There you have Lady Maege Mormont, who I see your ser Jorah has already reunited with.”

Danny’s head snapped around to see Jorah sitting next to, and looking horribly chastised by, a severe woman with his nose and jaw. 

“Ser Jorah?” Danny asked quietly.

Jorah cleared his throat, “My Queen, this is my sister and head of the House of Mormont, Lady Maege Mormont.”

Danny was glad she had trained her tongue to talk politely though whatever came her way. As she was staring, it was saying, “My Lady, a pleasure I am sure. Your brother has been many things to me – a hero and a friend. He has been great in battle and done your house honor.”

To her shock, Maege Mormont snorted nastily, “Aye, so I hear, my Lady. Glad he’s at least found someone he cares for, if not his damn family.”

“Maege, please. You will have time to speak to your brother in private. For now, please be polite to our guest.”

“Of course, my Queen. Apologies.”

Sansa cleared her throat and continued around the table. There were Umbers and a Karstark, names Danny only knew from Jorah’s briefings on the North. A Samwell Tarly, Maester of the Wall, Sansa had said. He had a large chain around his fat neck and his hands shook even as he nodded at Danny with all the dignity his rank offered. Finally, the woman, Sarella Sand, wrapped in cloaks and fingers knit around a goblet of hot wine.

“I believe you met and killed my cousin,” Sarella Sand said in a voice that was slick as oil. “Quentyn Martell. He had hoped for your hand in marriage, or my Lord Uncle had led him to believe. A shame he died at the flame of your dragons.” She smiled.

“I recall Quentyn, yes. He was very brave, if foolish.”

“Oh, indeed.”

Sarella, Danny noticed, wore a chain like Sam’s, and a smile like a snake’s.

“You know,” Danny said her own introductions, “Lord Tyrion and ser Jorah, I see. These men are my Bloodriders, Aggo and Kovarro. They are the blood of my blood.”

The Northerners were clearly puzzled by the Dorthraki custom, but they smiled politely and nodded. Or, Sansa did while the others watched quietly.

“To business, I think,” Sansa said when they had eaten.

Danny was back in her element.

“Allow me to lay out what I have behind me, shall I?” Danny asked, practically interrupting the Northern Queen. “A hundred-thousand Dothraki riders, eight thousand Unsullied, three dragons, and what remains of the Southron armies. I could siege your hold and starve you out within months. I have seen your home, your supplies, and we both know that you could not withstand me.”

Whispering erupted from Sansa’s supporters and Danny could sense – for the first time, Danny realized – real hostility from them. Arya Stark was scowling so deeply that it made her look more than twice her age.

Tyrion cleared his throat, “But I think we would be willing to accept your peace if you bent the knee. Pledge your allegiance to your rightful Queen and we will end this warring nonsense. We, I suspect, are all tired of war. Ready to drink and fuck in peace, yes?”

Jon Snow laughed, “If only. Though I suspect your Unsullied might see if differently, eh? I know my men break their vows, but yours don’t have that option.”

“Sers, I’m afraid there will be no drink to indulge nor women to fuck if the armies find their way through the Wall,” Sansa said. “You see, Queen Daenerys, the North this was a war on two fronts. From both the South and the North.”

“I’ve heard tell of your Ice Men. The Others? They cannot stand against my dragons. Bend the knee and I will melt them where they stand. Bend the knee and we will have peace in Westeros again.”

“No,” Meera Reed said. “Not the Others. They are what holds the Wall. It would have fallen long ago if they had not taken up sword and sent their armies against the Giants. We fight the Children, Queen. Your dragons cannot melt the thick skin of the giants. I fear the Children would warg into your beasts and take them for themselves. They have already taken men, beasts, giants, and corpses.”

“And family,” Sansa Stark agreed quietly. “You see, Queen Daenerys, it is not the Others we fight. It is the Children of the Forrest. We once saw them as Gods among men. We know better now. They use their magic and their Trees to capture our minds and remove our wills. They took my brother, Bran, who had his own great powers of the mind. Their trees ate him and his powers strengthened them. They were able to awaken their Giants and turned their sights south.

“Meera Reed and her brother Jojen thought they were doing the will of the Gods and brought my brother North of the Wall to study and hone his powers. It saw Jojen killed and it was only by her own power and great strength that Meera made it to the Wall and could pass on the reality of our enemies.”

“And the Others?” Tyrion asked. “They are fighting for you now?”

Sansa Stark nodded her pretty head and looked to Jon Snow, “They were monsters created from the stock of the First Men to protect the Children. But some regained their own wills and turned against their masters. They fight the Children and have joined us. If we can defeat the Children, they will have the North to reign and live. That is what they ask. And they want women – strong women who can bear them children.”

Danny’s head reeled. She glanced to Jorah and to Tyron. Both seemed as surprised as she.

“This,” Danny said, “changes nothing. My men and my dragons still have more strength than the Children. There is magic somewhere that can ward them away from the minds of my army. I will find it. I will fight with you if you bend the knee.”

“We already have the magic. A Stark must rule from Winterfell. When my family left, that was when the Wall began to weaken. I have returned, one of only three Starks left, and that connection if what protects my men, the Wall, and the Others from the magic of the Children.” 

“Then you will protect my men and my dragons. I do not see the problem.”

“A Stark must rule. When the First Men bent the knee to your ancestors, the power of the spell that had kept the Children at bay weakened. They awoke and that was when they regained their power. Arya is here if I die. Our brother Rickon in in Dorne, a last hope if Arya and I fall. I seek husbands for Arya and I as we speak so that we may repopulate our families. But we must rule in the North.”

Danny sat back quietly. Thought.

“You must rule? And I take it that you have a pact of sorts with Dorne?”

“With my Lord Uncle, yes,” Sarella Sand said. “Before you came to Westeros, the Dornish joined forces with the Veil, the Riverlands, and the North to defeat the false Baratheons, the Tyrells, and the Lanisters. The Dornish were the only force strong enough to get supplies to the North, and to keep their small army strong. Sansa gained me, and she sent her brother, Rickon Stark, south, to my Lord Uncle. In exchange, my people would take control of the South – The Reach, King’s Landing, and the Lannister lands and Sansa would have the Riverlands and those lands to the north. She cannot surrender and lay down her arms or Rickon Stark dies.”

“Then why sue for peace? You knew what I would demand.”

“I can broker an arrangement between the three kingdoms. You can keep the south, I would even be willing to move the Riverlands’ boarder farther North, if you would have me. You would also have what is now Dorne. In exchange, we defeat the Children together. When that is finished, you and I help to clear out the stone men from the Rhoynar and return the Prince Doran and the Dornish to their ancestral home. It is uninhabited and we would not be taking land away from anyone but the maddened sick.”

“And why would the Dornish be willing to give up their lands now?”

“Dorne is dying,” Sarella Sand spoke up. “The desert reclaims her and she will soon be nearly uninhabitable. I hear that such a thing has happened to those cities far to the east. They are dust and death. My people seek new life elsewhere. We sought it first in the south lands of Westeros, but my Uncle’s heart lies in the Rhoynar. He will not live much longer, and wishes with all his heart to see his ancestral home brought back to life.”

Danny recalled the Red Waste and Vaes Tolorro, The City of Bones. She understood the fears of the Dornish all too well.

“And when he is dead, what should happen to our deal? Who would take his place? Quentyn Martell is dead.”

“Arianne Martell, his eldest and only daughter will inherit under Dornish law. She dislikes her father, but she will maintain his pacts. And she understands what will befall Dorne if she does not take her people elsewhere.”

Danny now knew why she had been brought here. She could see in the eyes of these people all that they had been through. They looked like the eyes of the slaves she had freed in the Salver Cities in Essos. They looked like the eyes of she and her brother when they had been beggared in the streets. They looked like the old Dorthraki who had settled into ruling and trading because they could no longer fight and rape and kill.

The eyes of war.

They sat in silence for a time, finishing the dregs of their wine, Arya and Jon joking across the table from Danny, Jorah murmuring with his sister, and the Reeds staring at her with their unnerving eyes. Danny gave herself another moment to examine Sansa. She wondered what this beautiful girl had been through. She wondered how she had taken Winterfell back from the Boltons. She wondered if this girl had picked up a sword and stabbed men herself, or if she had made her dog and her sister do it for her. She wondered if there was any real difference.

“Sansa Stark,” Daenerys said. “Walk with me. Let us talk away from influence.”

They rose and those around the table – and those around the Hall – rose with them. They separated. The Hound and Danny’s Bloodriders began to follow them, but were waved off by Danny. The Hound paused, and at Sansa’s nod returned to his cup. They stepped out into the cold evening air.

“I,” Danny said as they walked toward another ruined building being fixed and rebuild with great blocks of ice, “am used to suing for peace. But with slave masters and Dothraki. You are different. I think I prefer you, although answers came much easier with my old adversaries.” 

Sansa blushed prettily, “I will take that as a compliment. I myself am more used to conquering and not giving my enemies time to ask for peace. The Boltons did not seek peace, and Stannis Baratheon rejected my attempts so that I was forced to drive him south. By the by, is he dead? My informants said that they believed him so, but I wondered at the truth. He has been rumored dead before and those had proven false.”

“He is. Rotting in those horrible black dungeons. I am working to put his daughter, Shireen, in control of Dragonstone. She is a good, earnest girl.”

“I have never had the pleasure, but if she has your seal of approval, I am sure it is true. And the Queen Margaery? I heard too that you burned Highgarden. It was the only food producer left in the kingdom, but I suppose that was necessary. They were feeding your enemies. I just fear for the smallfolk who will go hungry.”

“Dead. I am importing food from Meereen. They will be fed.”

“Westeros is bigger than your pyramid city. Not all smallfolk can reach those places with food. Be aware of this, my Lady. The north was never ransacked like the Riverlands were. My people still have some food, though it is a small amount. And the Wall is near starvation as well. Only my pact with Dorne keeps my people fed.”

“This pact with Dorne. Do they know you are meeting with me?”

“They do. Had I not told them myself, Sarella would have done so. I ensured that she would not have to play traitor to me or her Lord Uncle. I said that I was meeting with you, and I was honest about my terms. I will not betray Dorne. I will not betray my people.”

“Does your crown and your honor mean so much to you?”

“Honor?” Sansa laughed. “That is a man’s game. The best fighters have no honor. The best men do right by their family. The best women will sacrifice their morals to protect their children. And my crown? Queen Daenerys, I would care nothing for a crown, especially not one my brother lost his life over, if not for the spell which it is so vital to.”

Danny found herself laughing.

Sansa did not join her.

“You would bend the knee for your people, if you believed you had the choice?”

“I would. But I cannot. My father was Warden of the North. I will be the Queen in the North. And I have ideas. Ways we could make our agreement come together. I had Sam and Sarella teach me of your Dothraki ways. The Kharls are equals who kneel before Mother Mountain. You will be the Kharl of the South, and I the Kharl of the North. One people, equal rulers who come together for the good of their smallfolk.”

“You overestimate how far Kharls will go to protect their Khalasar. They are your soldiers, not your responsibility.”

“But I do not believe I have overestimated your faith to your people. I know how far you have gone to free slaves and to bring those who follow you to safety. You would be a better ruler than Westeros has seen. But only if you do not let your greed destroy you.”

Danny felt anger boiling in her belly.

She also felt fear. 

They had captured men from all over Westeros, some even were spies for this Northern woman before her. They had all said the same: something horrible was coming south. When she had fought the Lannister and Stannis Baratheon, they had been meeting together for the first time in years, and she had made her move when they were all together. She had seen the letters they poured over and the plans they had drawn up. Even they knew something was moving south. She believed Sansa Stark – truly she did. But she wasn’t sure she was willing to cut up her kingdom. 

“I suggest a temporary truce. We defeat these monsters, these Children of the Forrest, and then we discuss how we will split up the kingdom. If there is to be war, let it not be between the wise.”

Sansa’s lips were thin, her pretty face flushed with cold, but she nodded. 

“Agreed. There is too much at risk to fight amongst ourselves. We shall see where the pieces fall, and then decide.”

**Author's Note:**

> This just popped into my head while I was working on other things. For the first time in ages and ages and ages I had an idea that I really wanted to write about, so I wrote away my Sunday morning in the heat.


End file.
